


Deep Breathing

by endemictoearth



Category: My Mad Fat Diary
Genre: F/M, Smut, Yoga, smut with substance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-18
Updated: 2014-02-18
Packaged: 2018-04-08 13:11:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,788
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4306374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/endemictoearth/pseuds/endemictoearth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rae and Finn are hanging out at hers, and when it is revealed that Rae knows some flexible yoga moves, Finn is intrigued.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Deep Breathing

**Author's Note:**

> Original note from Tumblr: Best way to describe this one is … smut with substance? A story that happens to contain smut? Anyway, I’ve put the smut under the cut (and in a Northern accent, those all three rhyme.) 
> 
> I started this before series 2 came out, but after we saw the scene in the bowling alley, and this evolved over a week or two. Hope you guys like it, and that it takes a micro-particle of sting out of watching episode 2, even for a second.

Once, as an experiment, they’d brought some daft yoga instructor to the hospital and had her lead “the mentals” (as Rae and Tix labeled their fellow patients) in some breathing exercises and sun salutations. Rae thought it was pointless and embarrassing, but she’d gotten ticked off by the matron for skipping group therapy on Thursday, so there wasn’t any way she was getting out of it. She couldn’t even fake being on her period; Dr. Nick knew her cycle was nonexistent and would want to do all kinds of prodding and poking at her if she announced her womanhood had miraculously returned.

No, she’d just have to lump it. Half-heartedly stretch and pretend like she was breathing deep and hope it didn’t last too long.

But when she got to the room, there weren’t as many patients as she’d imagined. It was all women, and Tix was there, hunched over, her crossed arms resting on her crossed legs. She smiled as Rae came to sit on the mat next to hers. 

“What barmy thing will they have us doing next?” Rae whispered. “Tai chi by the duck pond? Judo in the sun lounge? Netball???” 

Tix giggled and half-heartedly shushed her as the instructor came in the room.

She wasn’t especially fit; just a normal woman with tiny lovehandles encased in a wrap top and wide leg cotton trousers. No socks. She had one of those Radio 3 voices, like she was about to introduce the next classical album, and for some reason she carried herself like she was Cindy Fucking Crawford. Rae and Tix gave each other a look that silently said, “Get her, who does she think she is?” 

Her name was Sandra, short for Cassandra, apparently. She talked about how stress causes “the breath” to become constricted and how breathing deeply is important for “creating calm.” Rae felt herself holding in a scoff the whole time she spoke.

She didn’t get intrigued until Sandra mentioned imagining the breath traveling to different parts of the body. “Your can direct your breath to any part of your body. We focus too much on the lungs, but you can send breath to any part of you that needs attention. That’s the point of yoga, to check in with the body, to pay attention to what it is trying to tell us.”

And, just as quickly as she became intrigued, Sandra lost her again. Rae thought, “Yeah, my body’s trying to tell me it’s too fat and I need to lose five and a half stone!” Sandra droned on a bit more, and Rae didn’t tune back in until she started instructing them how to breathe and stretch.

When she took those first deep, conscious breaths, Rae imagined filling her brain with air and exhaling out all the bad thoughts. They flooded back in quick enough, popping up like bubbles in a fizzy drink, but there was that moment right after she’d exhaled them all all, before she went to inhale, when her brain was clear. Empty. Gloriously blank. 

It was a revelation. Her mind was never blank; it was always buzzing with a dozen (or, more likely, a hundred different worries.) When Kester had asked her what she thought of it the next day in their session, she grimaced. “It was pretty stupid,” she complained. 

“Why was it stupid?” Kester leaned forward, with that look of skeptical curiosity that she found so intensely irritating. 

“Well, like stretching and breathing’s gonna fix anything? We’re all still mental. Yoga’s not gonna fix that.”

“Nooo,” Kester drawled. “It’s not meant to fix your problems, but to give you another tool in your arsenal to cope with those problems. Did you feel better afterwards?”

He waited patiently for her reply as she squirmed in the low-slung chair. 

“Maybe a little. Couldn’t make my mind a blank, nowhere close, but there were a couple of moments where it felt … clearer.”

“Like you’d set down your backpack of bullshit, maybe?” Kester flashed her a crinkly-eyed smile and she rolled her eyes in response. He wasn’t getting anymore off her today. She’d admitted yoga wasn’t the stupidest idea in the history of this hospital, what did he he want, a bloody medal for it?

* * *

Months and months later, Finn and Rae were slouched on the sofa in her sitting room on a gray afternoon. The telly was on, but neither were paying particular attention to it. Finn had pulled Rae’s legs up across his lap and they were both flicking through back issues of NME. 

“Next up, a documentary on the healing power of yoga …” the announcer droned over the closing credits of Antiques Roadshow. 

Rae looked up and mumbled absent-mindedly, “Oh, I’ve tried that. You can change the channel, if you want.”

“You’ve done yoga?” Finn asked, with sudden interest. “What, that’s, like, stretching and that?”

“Yeah, and breathing.” Rae nodded as she turned the page in her magazine.

“But, like … I thought I heard … don’t some people do yoga for … flexibility?” He looked up at her with such innocence on his face that there could only be filth on his mind. 

“Oi, watch it!” she shouted, rolling up her magazine to swat him on the shoulder, trying to hide the grin that spontaneously bloomed on her features. It didn’t work, though, and Finn grinned back, leaning forward to ask, “So, like, you wanna show me some … what are they called? … Positions?” 

“Poses. Yoga has poses, you randy bastard. And no, I’m not going through the sun salutation. Might be sexy if Kylie Minogue did it; you’d just end up laughing at me.”

Finn’s face clouded over. She knew he hated it when she badmouthed herself, but he despised it when she dragged his imagined opinions into it. “You know I wouldn’t Rae, how many times?” He leaned back and angrily snapped his magazine open. 

“No, I know. I’m sorry, I know.” She started to get anxious. She always knew she was going to fuck this up one day, but over something as stupid as yoga? No chance.

He glanced up at her briefly. “Whatever,” he said, eyes returning to the page, but Rae could tell he wasn’t focusing on anything. It was just a place to look that wasn’t at her. She sat up, lifting her legs off his lap, and he sighed. “I didn’t mean for you to—” he started, but stopped when he saw Rae stand right in front of him. She looked at him briefly and then focused her gaze on the wall above his head. She seemed to just be standing there, but it was like she grew an inch taller in front of his eyes. He inwardly grimaced, that’s all he needed, for her to be even more statuesque. It was the one thing he felt inadequate about in their relationship, but he tried to sweep that out of his mind as he studied her curiously. 

She swung her arms out to meet over her head, like a ballerina might, and Finn couldn’t help but notice her breasts look magnificent, like the prow of some battleship. He’d like to maneuver his ship into her harbor … ahem. He cleared his throat and shifted in his seat, laying the magazine over his lap. Then she sort of dove forward to touch her toes, looking up a moment later, back flat enough to set a cup of tea on. He imagined himself standing behind her, hands either side of her hips, the two of them moving together. Fuck, the NME had begun to look like a pup tent in his lap, the spine of the magazine taking on greater dimension every second. He grabbed the issue Rae had left behind and added it to the pile, trying to disguise his excitement, in case her mum or Karim barged in the front door. Then she leaned forward again, and reversed the pseudo swan dive thing to stand up, her hands resting clasped on her chest. She still hadn’t looked at him.

Now she focused on the carpet as she took a big step backward with her right leg. She put her hands either side of her left foot and stepped that one back to meet her other leg. Now she was in an inverted V shape. She could feel her neck tense up from the effort of not looking at Finn to see his expression. 

He had endured all of this in a tense, lust-filled silence, but no longer. “Now, what  _exactly_  isn’t sexy about my girlfriend’s luscious arse perfectly balanced three feet in front of my face?” 

Rae started to giggle and she collapsed sideways, looking up at Finn. She expected to see him smiling back at her, but his face was as serious as a statue, and looked carved from stone. She sat up, pulling her shirt down to cover her stomach. “A-anyway, that’s the sun salutation. Well, part of it.”

Finn’e eyes were still boring into hers. In a voice that sounded like he’d just played a regulation-length football game with no substitutions, he breathed, “When’s your mum back?”

Rae shrugged. “Think she’s only on until five, for once. Unless they ask her to stay late.” She was being purposefully obtuse. She refused to believe that Finn could get turned on just by looking at her. She understood him getting excited when they kissed and touched and fondled each other … with his eyes closed. When they had sex in dimly lit rooms, sure. But he couldn’t be ready just by looking at her fat form twisting into a couple of yoga poses … could he?

Finn swallowed and then asked, in a husky voice that went straight to Gushington Central, “And Karim? Where’s he?” Rae didn’t know. She wished she did. 

“I dunno. His note just said, ‘Out. Back later.’ He doesn’t really have a grasp on English. Or time-keeping, apparently.” She laughed nervously. 

“Let’s go up to your room.” The words could be taken as a suggestion, but Finn’s tone made them sound like an urgent inevitability. 

Rae nodded. “Um, alrigh’.” There wasn’t a lock, but at least they could shut the door. It seemed like Finn was a man with a mission.

He flung the magazines to one side and Rae got a good look at the fabric stretched tightly across Finn’s erection. Her eyes instinctively flitted to the cover of the NME he just tossed. It was Robbie Williams with his gob opened wide. Enough to put anyone off. She could almost feel something shift inside her head and click into place. Finn must genuinely desire her. She twisted herself up to stand and Finn had her hand in his, practically dragging her up the stairs. 

When they got to her room, Finn closed the door quietly and then turned to Rae, who was standing by her bed. “Rae?” he breathed.

“Yeah?” she exhaled in return. At this rate her bedroom window would fog up from the inside.

“Could you do that thing again, with your …” he made a wide inverted v with his hands, then gestured to her arse. 

“Ummmm,” she felt herself stalling. What did he want to do? “That’s called downward dog.” Finn’s eyes nearly bugged out of his head. 

“Huh-really? Well, that’s-that’s a good name for it, I’d say.” He cleared his throat and watched as Rae leaned forward again. When she was in position—POSE, she reminded herself—Finn stepped behind her and gently worked her legs apart to stand behind her. He wasn’t going to … was he? She could feel how ready he was on the inside of her thigh, but he just stood there. Curious, she twisted around to see what he was up to. He was just stood there, staring at her rear, eyes shining.

“Finn! What’s the matter?” Was there something wrong with her? The desire barometer on her inside thigh would indicate no, it was still throbbing away at full mast.

“It’s just—sometimes your arse is so perfect, Rae, it makes me want to cry.” Rae swallowed a surprised gasp. Those were the words she used about him! 

“Get away,” she mumbled, turning her head to look at the wall.

“I will not,” Finn stated, settling a little closer to her before running his hands up under her oversized tshirt to grasp the waistband of her leggings and pants. “Is this okay?” he asked, and didn’t start to pull them down as one, until she nodded warily. “Are you sure?” he asked when she was half-exposed.

“Yeah, as long as we’re not … I mean, you don’t want to put it … y’know?”

Finn looked at her confused for a second. “Oh! No! No, I can get to the promised land from here.” 

She nodded more confidently this time, and he slid her leggings all the way down her legs, kissing the back of her left knee as he did. She gasped and her knee buckled slightly. Finn said, “Maybe we can move you to the bed, so you’re a little more comfy?” He guided her over to her twin bed and arranged her on her knees, gently pushing her elbows out of their locked position to rest on the mattress. He admired the curve of her rear once again, and then undid his jeans and pulled on a johnny before drawing her back towards him. Rae felt his fingers on her, working expertly to get her aroused. The didn’t have a hard job, because she had been quivering on the edge ever since she’d seen Finn was ready downstairs. He slipped two fingers inside her and gently slid them in to the second knuckle, then the ring finger joined to form a triumphant triumvirate, sliding in and out until Rae shouted Finn’s name. He half-heartedly shushed her, but no one came barging through the door.

Satisfied she was ready, he drew his fingers out and placed both hands on either side of her hips, thumbs digging into the creamy flesh of her backside, as the most excited part of him was quivering, the tip just at the entrance to Rae’s lady garden. He took his right hand and guided himself in, as the terrain was unfamiliar from this angle. He didn’t get far before Rae moaned. He tilted his pelvis to thrust upwards and grabbed her hip again. She started to move back unconsciously as he plunged forward. Their bodies figured out the rest of the mechanics and they moved together like a well-oiled machine, each revolution causing a bigger thrill in his heart and his groin, and by the noises Rae was making, she was enjoying this, too. 

Finally, Finn thrust his hips forward just as Rae raised hers a degree, and it was like a key slipping into a lock in the door to Heaven. He saw stars, and Rae hummed through her nose as she clenched herself around him in the most deliciously torturous way. When he was done, he slumped forward, and hugged Rae around the waist, pressing his lips to her spine. She shuddered and he pulled back, allowing her to pull her leggings up and collapse on the bed before he pulled his pants up, tucked himself away, and did the same. 

As they lay there, panting, Rae’s smile started to fade a little. “You-you don’t really think my arse is perfect, do you?” 

Finn frowned at her sadly. “I honestly do, Rae. You have no idea. Just the way it curves, and there are these two dimples just below your waist, and it’s … it’s fucking breathtaking.”

Rae shook her head disbelievingly. “You don’t have to believe me, Rae, but that is a championship medal winning bum you’ve got.” Finn reached over to grab a handful of what he was talking about.

“Oi!” she squealed and twisted to try and grab his, too, and they wrestled for a bit on the bed, before Finn swooped forward to kiss her lips and they were all twisted together, breathing heavy between kisses. 

When they caught their breaths a second time, Rae looked up through her lashes in that way that made Finn’s heart flip over and spin. “Well, if we’re making arse-based confessions … I’ve wanted to bite into yours like a violent dog since the first time I saw you.”

Finn’s eyes widened before crinkling into a smile. “Well, lose the ‘violent’ part, and it could maybe be arranged.”

They both laughed and held each other close. The laughter subsided, but they were still clinched in their embrace. Finally, Finn whispered Rae’s name into her ear.

“Yeah?” she whispers tremulously.

“Kylie Minogue has NOTHING on you.”

Rae laughed, and then he added, “Might have to ask Archie about yoga classes down the leisure center!


End file.
